Derry Girls Season 3: A Cracker Series End
4.5/5 Falcons
December 8, 2022
After a three-year-long hiatus, the third and final season of the hit Irish comedy Derry Girls was released on Netflix. This season, which would come in at seven episodes (including an hour-long finale), was first released on a weekly basis in the United Kingdom during the past spring, which meant that we American viewers had a bit of catching up to do. At the time of its airing, Derry Girls became the most-watched show in Northern Ireland and also quickly rose in popularity throughout the UK shortly thereafter. While it never got to the level of fame in the United States, Derry Girls is by far one of the funniest, laugh-out-loud shows in sitcom history.
The show centers around Erin, a sixteen-year-old girl living in Northern Ireland during the Troubles in the 1990s. The cast of characters includes her kooky friend group and their families as they navigate everyday life in this era. It’s a coming-of-age story, with the Troubles setting the scene for the teens’ misadventures in the city and at their school, Our Lady Immaculate. They weave in the ongoing events but focus primarily on the kids, who are mostly interested in living their ideal teenage lives. It’s a perfect balance. While watching, you never forget the political situation that they’re in, but the show doesn’t turn it into trauma porn. It delivers a satisfying and fitting conclusion along with a beautiful narrative about adulthood.
In season three, this changes. The Troubles are brought to the forefront of the story, with the final episode centering around the Good Friday Referendum in 1998. The kids we’ve known for the first two seasons are now eighteen and able to cast their vote in a decision that will change the history of their country and potentially bring an end to the conflict that has been going on since even their parents were young. It’s a wonderful way to show how the characters have grown and matured over time. As the seasons progress, they become more and more actively aware of the world around them and start to take it more seriously, as well as realize their roles in it.
This doesn’t mean that the final season is without its flaws, of course. Many plotlines felt a bit more forced than in previous seasons, with stories that were more outrageous and less believable. Many times, it was confusing how the characters got from point A to point B, especially given what we knew about them. Many plotlines either seemed rushed to be completed or were never brought up again, especially as the show got darker. In addition, production issues and actor complications made the season more broken apart near the end and threw the characters’ dynamics out of whack.
Overall, season three does not live up to the perfect and wacky first two, but the bar was set very high. It delivers a satisfying and fitting conclusion along with a beautiful narrative about adulthood. The show never loses its natural charm; the punchy dialogue and nearing-on-the-edge-of-unrealistic-yet-believable characters are the same as always. Episodes like “Halloween” and “The Affair” will have your eyes watering from both hilarious and heartfelt moments alike.
This article also appears in our November 2022 print edition.
